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Please Keep NXT Away from the Main WWE Roster

September 14, 2014 | Posted by Wyatt Beougher

Introduction: While half-watching Monday Night RAW this week (my flight the previous night didn’t get me home until after midnight and I started my day at 5:15 am, so I may or may not have been dozing), my ears perked up at the mention of the NXT championship match that was going to occur this week. Other than the few times JBL remembered that he was actually supposed to be the Commissioner of the WWE’s developmental promotion, it’s rare that NXT even get mentioned on the main roster shows, so imagine my surprise when it turned out that all four guys in said championship match were in a tag team match on RAW. It’s been three days now – I’m finishing this about eight hours before Takeover II: Fatal 4Way* – and my initial excitement has had some time to cool. As awesome as it was to see four of my favorites on RAW (well, three of my favorites and the surprisingly-good-in-NXT Tyson Kidd) and the Ascension on Main Event, I just don’t think it’s a good idea for the WWE to be mixing NXT with the main roster shows.

Back in the 80’s, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups had a pretty cheesy commercial that featured a young man walking down the street eating chocolate when he bumped into a woman walking the opposite direction eating a jar of peanut butter (like I said, cheesy). He drops his chocolate into her peanut butter and they realize that chocolate and peanut butter taste great together. That’s the tagline for the whole commercial – “Two great tastes that taste great together!” When I first saw the NXT tag team match on RAW, that’s pretty much how I felt; however, the more I think about it, the more it feels like the brown stuff that RAW’s walking down the street with is, to paraphrase “Stone Cold” Steve Austin “what comes out of the south end of a northbound chicken”. As I’ve mentioned previously, NXT is definitely my peanut butter, and I’m not sure that mixing it with RAW is actually going to make the sum greater than the parts.


This is as close as I ever want John Cena to appearing on NXT. Well, closer, really.

Right now, NXT is my happiest of happy places in wrestling – the matches matter and are usually awesome, the booking has an old-school feel with modern sensibility, and there are characters there that just wouldn’t work anywhere else**. Think back to ArRIVAL – remember how awesome Emma vs Paige was? Now look at last week’s RAW and the state of the Divas division, like I did last week. And think about how Emma was used prior to Santino’s retirement and her shoplifting arrest. Does any of that even remotely resemble what we saw on ArRIVAL? Or, my favorite example, Bray Wyatt and his family – Wyatt actually was everything he claims to be on RAW, and he was bulletproof, something the WWE has repeatedly missed the boat on making him during his time on the main roster. Rowan and Harper were tag team champions and looked massively dominant, but every time they or their leader approach the heights they reached in NXT, the WWE cuts the legs out from beneath them.

Does some of my trepidation make sense now? Sure, seeing Sami Zayn, Tyler Breeze, Adrian Neville, and Tyson Kidd on RAW was awesome, not unlike the ECW Invasion of RAW back in the 90s, but I think it needs to stay separate/sporadic enough to keep appearances like this feeling special. The guy who runs NXT, Triple H, even agreed with me on that point, as during his conference call leading up to Takeover II, he mentioned that if NXT talent appears on the main roster shows too often, then they cease being NXT talent and become RAW and Smackdown talent.

Another thing that Triple H said during the conference call that really stuck with me was that he didn’t see NXT as simply a developmental promotion, but more what ECW was to the WWE and WCW during the Monday Night Wars. I think that’s a fantastic comparison, and, surprisingly enough, Triple H makes a perfectly acceptable Paul Heyman. If you think about it, NXT is the breeding ground for future talent, just like ECW was. It’s also where international stars debut in the US before they make it to the big stage, just like ECW was. It offers a product that’s completely different from what you get on the main two promotions’ weekly network shows, just like ECW was (although the premises of NXT and ECW are completely different, I’ll admit, but that’s a column for another time, like next week). And NXT, right now, is primarily watched by the “smarter” portion of wrestling’s overall fanbase, just like ECW was.


Yeah, you’re probably never going to see a match like this in NXT, but the comparison is still surprisingly valid in spite of that.

And sure, that initial “invasion” of RAW by the ECW wrestlers was awesome, just like the NXT tag team match on RAW was. But think back to the actual “Invasion” storyline – as amazing at is was that first time Dreamer and RVD came through the crowd, remember how quickly the WWE booking team botched the entire angle? On top of that, look no further than the examples of the NXT talent that’s been called up in the past year or so to see how effectively the WWE main roster writing crew is able to book them. At one point, it felt like the Shield would be the rule by which debuting NXT talent would be booked, but with the bumbling of the Wyatt Family, Emma, Paige, Bo Dallas, and Adam Rose, it certainly appears that history will remember them as the exception.

My worst fear is that, at this point it feels like Vince McMahon just lets Triple H have full control over NXT, while Vince himself has final approval over everything that happens on RAW and Smackdown. If the NXT roster starts appearing more frequently on main roster shows and that increases viewership for NXT, how long before Vince decides that he needs final approval over NXT as well? I do not feel like I am exaggerating when I say that if that day comes, NXT as we know it will die a slow death and become another boring, homogenous WWE show. Don’t believe me? Look no further than Smackdown – back around the turn of the century, when Paul Heyman was given some autonomy over the “B show”, he used the Brand Extension to his advantage and turned it into the WWE’s “sports” show, while RAW remained the “entertainment” show. As my colleague Greg DeMarco pointed out this week, that is the role that NXT currently occupies – it is definitely sports entertainment, but the emphasis is on the sport aspect moreso than the entertainment. I honestly believe that the average two-hour NXT live special features more actual wrestling than the average three-hour WWE main roster PPV/live event.


Does anyone really want to give this up for another Smackdown?

Do we really need another RAW recap/rehash show? I am of the belief that the WWE does not need a single show like the current incarnation of Smackdown, so I definitely do not think that they need to turn NXT into another one. But I still think that that is exactly what will happen if Vince McMahon or Kevin Dunn take control of the developmental promotion, so for the love of wrestling, WWE, keep your suspect chocolate out of my peanut butter.

*Believe it or not, I write the column first and then write the introduction. Maybe my brain is wired backwards, but it just seems to work better for me.

**Without significantly better booking anyway.

Wyatt Beougher is a lifelong fan of professional wrestling who has been writing for 411 for over three years and currently hosts MMA Fact or Fiction and reviews Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

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